“Man overboards”—the event of a person falling from some height into the water, are serious concerns. There are many elements which make man overboard events dangerous. They often occur under adverse conditions, such as at night or in high seas. If the air or water temperature is cold, a more than temporary exposure can lead to hypothermia and death. If the fall is from a great height, such as the top of a cruise vessel or oil platform, the fall can injure, knock unconscious, or even kill the fall victim. For reasons such as these, hobbyist, commercial, and military vessels all have protocols for rescuing people who have fallen into the water. However, given the conditions in which a man overboard event happens, protocols are no substitute for immediate detection and speed of recovery.
The incidence of man overboard events on ocean-going passenger cruise vessels has been of such increasing concern recently that it led to a Congressional mandate. In 2010, Congress passed the Cruise Vessel Safety and Security Act (“CVSSA”) to address the issue of properly detecting persons who fall overboard. The CVSSA requires that “the vessel shall integrate technology that can be used for capturing images of passengers or detecting passengers who have fallen overboard, to the extent that such technology is available.”
Such technology is virtually non-existent, and where extant, is crude at best. Man overboard detection systems are confronted with the formidable challenges of being automatic or semi-automatic, performing in and out of daylight, and operating with high levels of certainty and extremely low false alarm rates at all times and in all waters. Moreover, they must perform under adverse weather conditions and cope with at least moderate vessel movement such as pitching and listing. An improved system and method for detecting man overboard incidents is needed.